Is a Ralph
Wood Sharp-Face toby jug: Charles James Fox?
Ray & Diane
are sharing a personal thought about the link between
Fox and a Ralph Wood toby.
Written January
4th 2012: This information shared is to help with identification
of early toby jug models & clarify some of the elder
statesmen from British history that we believe The Wood
family of Staffordshire potters modelled from, some tobies
have already been written about, this particular one has
not.
There is not much
evidence to identify different models from the first period
tobies made, but every now and then clues appear that
point us in the right direction, many names being associated
from "word of mouth" & characteristics of
individual models handed down over the years. The "Squire",
a country gent that sits in an expensive three cornered
chair smoking a pipe, this model has been associated with
Ralph Wood the honest miller. (a picture can be seen in
the "Wood family of Burslem by Frank Faulkner) Another
rare model "The Welshman" is said to depict
Sir Watkin Williams Wynn, head of a family who had estates
near Ruabon, MP for Denbighshire, he died in 1749.(Questionable
date for a toby).
Our early memories:
In the late 70's a rare toby called the "Sharp-Face"
was very seldom seen, it was always known as George Brown
to "old school" dealers, a politician of the
late 60's. An encounter with a dealer/friend suggested
that the well known politician Lord George-Brown was always
compared with the likeness of Charles James Fox who's
portrait hangs with other past Chancellors in number 11,
Downing Street, this twinning was from his reading of
a popular political history book that mentioned it was
common knowledge with MP's in the parliament of that time.
There was also a rare bust of Charles James Fox, that
was described as being potted by Enoch Wood, inscribed
on the reverse.(Records do show that Fox was a subject
of an E.Wood bust, circa approx 1795, and this was supported
by contemporary portraits). The bust, when sold through
auction, had a written description for Fox as "the
ugliest man in Parliament"... I don't think we will
ever know the true identity of the individual toby models
unless marked but we are quite happy to go along with
this theory. Look at the
similarities and see for yourselves the comparisons...If
you have any other thought we would be pleased to hear
from you. We also have another theory about the Roman
-Nose ...but that's for another day!!!
The Sharp-Face
toby jug potted by Ralph Wood: As the model sits
in the evolution of the toby, he always appears quite
primitive and early (1780's) in his manufacture...to date
we haven't seen a model of this jug that hasn't been with
a typical Ralph Wood running glaze decoration.
